The Good Immigrant (ed by Nikesh Shukla), an essay collection written by emerging black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) writers, has been voted Britain’s favourite book of 2016 at the inaugural Books Are My Bag Readers Awards, reports the Guardian. The essay collection, which was published via the crowdfunding platform Unbound, was chosen in a poll of more than 50,000 readers who cast their votes online and in bookshops around the UK. The Good Immigrant explores migration, stereotypes and race in Britain. Shukla told the Guardian: ‘I’ve been told by publishers, on multiple occasions, that “books by ethnic minorities don’t sell” and also that “we only publish the best books”. The first one is always insulting, because it reduces my skin colour to a marketing trend, and not a very lucrative one, which is preposterous. And the best books? Are we really so sure, in this subjective taste-driven industry, that the best books are out there?’ Books Are My Bag Readers Awards were also presented to Max Porter’s Grief is the Thing with Feathers (Faber) for best fiction, Matt Haig’s Reasons to Stay Alive (Canongate) for best nonfiction, Bill Bryson’s The Road to Little Dribbling (Black Swan) for best biography, and Julia Donaldson’s The Detective Dog (Macmillan) for best children’s book. Joanna Cannon was named breakthrough author for her debut novel The Trouble with Goats and Sheep (HarperCollins), and The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry (Serpent’s Tail) was chosen by booksellers as the most beautiful book of the year. The shortlists were selected by booksellers. For more information about the awards, click here.